As The Moon Kindles The Night
by SilverSpring
Summary: "The first time he met her, he knew she was something special. He had bumped into her, quite by accident, one day when the summer fair had been to town and the sky was a glorious shade of ocean blue."
1. Part I

**i.**

* * *

_The first time he met her, he knew she was something special. _

_He had bumped into her, quite by accident, one day when the summer fair had been to town and the sky was a glorious shade of ocean blue. _

* * *

Strolling along the pavement on his way home, Enjolras is quite content to lick at an ice cream and contemplate the clouds, when out of nowhere he is hit with the spine of a hardback book (its owner having walked straight into him); ending up with a nose full of vanilla.

'_Hey!_'

He blinks through a curtain of chocolate sauce to see a pair of deep brown eyes staring back at him.

"_Watch where you're_ - oh".

Picking up the book now lying open on the ground, he hands it shyly over, noting the words scribbled on the inside cover.

"Is – is this yours?"

The girl simply looks at him, her solemn dark eyes taking in the sight of the ice cream now dripping from the end of his nose, and her lips curl in a dry smirk.

"You have pistachios in your eyebrows."

Cheeks burning, he rubs his face on his sleeve and desperately tries to hide his own awkward grin, while she bites her lip and turns her attention to her toes.

Enjolras hovers there for a while, shuffling from foot to foot and unsure of what to do next - but as the girl glances back up at him through long sooty lashes, the mischievous glint of laughter in her eyes makes his decision for him.

Terrified, the small boy makes a run for it, the sound of hearty laughter washing over the back of his ears as he leaps through the front door of his parents' house.

(Peeking through the letterbox, he sees that she has once more buried her nose in her picture book, and is continuing on her way).

* * *

He knows he has met his match when the girl beats him at Sports' Day a month later.

He is as competitive as she is a cheat, and it isn't long before the event has turned into a fierce battle between the pair for first prize.

Ever since the New Girl had been seated at his table in school, they had been determined to outperform one another in everything from spelling to arithmetic, including the daily race to be first in line when the bell rang for lunch. For a new student, she has an uncanny knack for knowing all the shortcuts to the canteen, and is often seen giving a hearty wave to an infuriated Enjolras who stands with arms folded, three places behind her in the line.

But today – _today – _Enjolras is adamant that he will have his victory.

...

The girl beats him at the Egg and Spoon race; she is all elbows when she runs and Enjolras more than once drops the egg, proudly choosing instead to blame his clumsiness on the design of the cutlery.

To his dismay, they are paired together for the Three-Legged Race. Nonetheless, they take the challenge in their stride – literally - and they win, falling over the finish line with an extravagant flourish. He can't help but look at her in awe as they disentangle themselves from the scarves and from each other, and she simply grins at him, a little shyly, shrugging her shoulders before skipping off in search of her parents and an ice cream.

On the final sprint race of the day, they are both almost disqualified for trying to cross the starting line before the whistle blows, until the girl's father stealthily hands over a crisp banknote beneath the suspicious eyes of his fellow spectators. Still, it pays off, and once more the game is on for the two children nudging each other out of the way at the starting line.

When the whistle blows, Enjolras feels his feet have grown wings, and he howls indignantly as a blur of wild dark hair flies past him regardless.

"Eat my dust, sucker!"

(In the end, they tie for second place).

* * *

He knows when he sees the dim light coming from the tree-house in next door's garden that the girl's parents are fighting again.

"_They could shout for all of France," _his mother would say._ "They never were a match, in my opinion, but that's what comes of chasing dreams and not good solid practicality." _

The light in the tree-house stays lit for hours, and Enjolras wonders what the girl does to pass the time, boxed in with no one for company but the night moths and occasional restless squirrel. Sometimes on these evenings he stays awake too, refusing to turn off the night light on his bedside table.

"_Should've been gypsies, if you ask me. Could never stay put for long – he was just peculiar, and _her_, she was a holy terror when she was young, always running off after some new fancy. I'm surprised they settled down in this neighbourhood at all."_

He wonders if the girl notices the glow from his window, and if it is a comfort to her, keeping her company through the long hours of the night.

* * *

**ii.**

* * *

_He'd written the inscription down from memory, as it were, scrawled on a piece of paper torn from an old textbook. He finds it one day as he is spring-cleaning his room, casting junk into boxes, ready to be sold or simply thrown away. He still remembers how he had stood on this spot in the middle of the room, how he had held the paper in his hands, letting the words roll off his tongue in different ways as he worked out how to say her name. _

_(He pockets it). _

* * *

He knows the girl is changing when she starts to swop dungarees for light summer dresses, her gap-toothed smile thickening into a full pearly white grin.

He's not sure why, but it makes him sad (although, he's changing too).

He sees her sometimes on the sidewalk where they met all those years ago, and she throws him a little wave when she catches him staring from the window, his book forgotten on his lap.

The day she stops to talk to him is the day she has lost her pet rabbit "Peter" and he helps her search beneath the boughs of the cherry trees that grow along their avenue.

"Peter? That's original."

"It's Beatrix Potter!"

"Well, exactly. S'pose you read those when you were a kid?"

"Didn't everyone?"

"Not me."

It is easy to talk to her, really, and he does, chattering away as they meander down the street, balancing on the kerb like a tightrope with arms outstretched on either side of them. The fair has already been and gone this year, and whilst he is loathe to admit it, Enjolras rather misses the colourful banners and delicious smells that filled the town only a month ago, and wonders whether a life in the circus would be half bad.

"Anyway," she gesticulates, swinging her arms by her sides as he lays flat on his stomach to search for Peter beneath a large azalea bush, "I like reading, but I always preferred picture books."

Shuffling back onto his knees, Enjolras smiles at up at her from the grass.

"I know."

The sun continues his route across the sky, peeping through the clouds and winking at them cheerily, whilst the warm Spring breeze blows inland from the coast, trembling the leaves of the trees overhead; the promise of a hot summer just around the corner.

"Hey, remember the day I beat you at the Egg and Spoon race?"

"You never really beat me, it was a fluke!"

The young teens bicker like old chums for the rest of the hour as they search high and low, talking about anything and everything beneath the wide open sky.

(They eventually find the rabbit hiding in Mr Fauchelevent's vegetable patch at the end of the avenue, munching on a forbidden carrot).

* * *

He knows she is stressed when her hands are stained blue, Indian ink blotting and swirling in the lines of her palms, their patterns printed like a stamp on her furrowed forehead as she works out particularly difficult sums.

Exam season is always tough, and both students are equally determined to do well, although it must be said that Enjolras handles the stress much better.

He sits in quiet poise and concentration as papers fly furiously on the other side of the table in the library. Every so often he'll glance over the top of his book to where she sits facing him, masses of papers strewn haphazardly in front of her and a pen sticking out from behind her ear.

Sighing and fidgeting, she doesn't stay for long, hating to be cooped up in the stuffy heat of the library, and chooses instead to cycle her books to the park where she can revise in the fresh air.

(He knows this won't last long either, for the shouts of the children from the play park will drive her straight back regardless.)

* * *

He knows she is in another world when he's talking to her and she gets that look in her eye.

It's a look that comes back at the end of every school semester, when the holidays are nearing and the students are getting restless for adventure.

Today is the last day of term and their teacher has given up all hope of imparting wisdom, choosing instead to sit with his feet up and have a siesta under the heat of the afternoon sun, which is shining lazily through the classroom windows and illuminating every speck of dust that hangs blissfully in the air.

Enjolras leans over the desk in the noisy classroom and talks louder, but his companion merely 'hmms' nonchalantly and continues to stare into space, eyes trained on the sky outside.

Beneath her eyelashes he fancies he can see the very gulls soaring across that giant blue, their shadows flickering upon the long grasses which bend in the soft breeze that sweeps across the cliff tops.

There's no bringing her back to earth when she's in this mood.

So he lets her dream, and his words dwindle to sleepy silence.

* * *

"_To our darling Éponine, on your 1__st__ Christmas!_

_With lots and lots of love,_

_from Mummy and Daddy."_

* * *

When he arrives home early one summer evening he knows for sure that her parents have separated, for the car is still missing from their driveway, and it's been at least a week since he's heard from her.

He follows his instinct and the mossy stepping-stone path which leads to the old tree-house at the bottom of the garden next-door.

It's still daylight, and the flowers of mid-June are casting a fragrant perfume into the air, bees humming lazily in the last golden rays of the afternoon.

And she is there, as he knew she would be, huddled beneath her old comfort blanket in a corner of the wooden house, her old nursery books scattered around her feet and mascara caked half way down her reddened cheeks.

Slipping an arm around her shoulders protectively, and cursing the gods of Growing Up, he sits with her until dawn.

* * *

**_To Be Continued._**


	2. Part II

**iii.**

* * *

He knows it won't be long until both he and Éponine, too, go their separate ways; and to think he won't be seeing her every day sends a chill shivering through his bones.

She's talking animatedly to him now, one hand wrapped around a steaming mug of coffee while the others gesticulates wildly through the air, leaving a trail of smoke in its wake from the cigarette held slackly between her fingers.

He'd given up all attempts to force her to quit several months ago, for he really does hate the damn things. (Mind you, there's something about the slight rasp it injects into her voice that makes his heart beat wildly against his ribcage.)

At almost eighteen years old, the future is suddenly upon them and the pressures of being a real adult are starting to weigh upon their young shoulders. _What do you want to do with your life?_ They seem to ask it every day.

He'll be going off to college soon, and even though Éponine has picked the same campus, Enjolras cannot help but feel the looming terror of new friends and new priorities.

"Enjolras? Enjolras are you listening to me?"

He starts out of his reverie to see her gazing at him across the table, eyebrow raised and a halo of smoke crowning her loosely plaited hair.

She tilts her head to the side questioningly, a frown playing across her forehead as she opens her cherry red lips to reprimand his inattentiveness.

And before he knows it, he has blurted out the question.

"Do you want to live together in college?"

* * *

He knows how to touch her as something fragile and holy, knows how to elicit the muffled cries and soft breaths at intervals which echo down the empty hall outside her bedroom, none to hear it in the stillness of the night but the paper flowers which decorate the walls of their shared apartment and the lone mouse which has made its home behind the skirting board near the front door.

He knows how to trail his fingertips across the faint scars on her knee, testimony to all those times they attempted to climb the old chestnut tree in the park as children. (Their parents would scold every time they arrived home with cuts and scrapes, but the pair would not rest until the day they would reach the very top branches.)

He knows how to plant soft kisses down the ridges of her spine, which send her body arching back into his chest; knows that her arms will loop around him with a gentle tug at the hairline on the base of her neck.

He knows that a nibble at her collarbone will send her toes curling at his ankles.

And when she clutches his hair and rubs her nose against his, he knows that she feels safe here with him; and so he nestles her closer, hoping that his heart will beat a warm and loyal promise into hers.

* * *

He knows not to argue when she forgets to meet him for their dinner reservations three times in a row.

University life has demanded a busy routine and both Enjolras and Éponine have hit the ground running. As competitive as ever, the two young students are determined to excel at their studies.

The autumn winds cast a sharp nip into the air as the winter nights draw in, and Enjolras spends most of his time rushing to and fro between his classes and the library, occasionally bumping into Éponine and her friends as they too do circuits of campus, scarves wrapped tightly around their throats to protect from the bitter gales. And in the comfort of their apartment, they discuss their days over a bowl of hot tomato soup which thaws out their freezing hands.

The months go by like hours, the days like minutes; and it is not long before haggard lines start to appear on her forehead, fatigue beneath his eyes.

Between the occasional pizza party hosted for their friends, the pair continue their dance, running for lectures early in the morning and studying long into the night, and every once in a while, it is suddenly 11.30pm on a Friday evening and they've barely spoken in three days.

On these occasions Enjolras forces himself from his books and gently lifts the pen from her hand, tugging her towards the sofa for a movie night.

Still, there is a distance in her gaze far beyond where he once could follow, and they no longer laugh like they used to.

Enjolras cannot stop his mother's voice from echoing in his ears.

"_Should've been gypsies_, _loyal to nothing and no one_._ People like them, they don't stick around_."

So, at a loss for words, he simply showers the girl with affection, catching her wrist every so often to press his lips to her knuckles, twirling her around in a wild dance across the kitchen tiles before she pulls away with an apologetic smile, and shuts herself inside her room.

And every touch seems to say, _"I'm here, you know_";

every kiss, _"remember me."_

* * *

**iv.**

* * *

"_Will you ever forgive it, my letting go?"_

"_I do, Ep. But I'm not sure I'll ever understand it."_

* * *

He knows she is drifting away from him in their final year of university, for she spends almost all of their free time taking weekend trips away on her own, and Enjolras can't help but feel they've reached the end of the road.

For a while he forgets how to talk to her entirely, can't remember the last time they shared anything more than a passing _Good Morning_ or _Good Night._

Of course, he knows Courfeyrac is right when he tells him Éponine just needs some time alone, to figure out her life and find her own feet.

He spends his days with his friends, trying not to bombard Cosette and Musichetta with the never-ending questions that run through his mind. _How is Éponine? Has she been home to see her mother? How did she find her exam last week? Let me know if you see her, she's always gone by morning but never comes home until late. _

The cigarette smoke that lingers in the apartment catches in his throat and makes his eyes water, but Enjolras insists that he enjoys the taste on his tongue, the smell in the air.

(Although he won't explain why).

And so, he retreats into the books that are stacked mountain-high by his bedside table, and listens for the creak of the front door, reading long into the night until the letters become squiggles on the page.

The other students cast him the odd pitiful look and small smile, and speak of other things.

* * *

He knows things are looking up again when she bounces through the door one afternoon, and it's the first time he has seen her look so alive in a long time.

For the last few years they have spoken only a handful of times, as she drifted in and out of his life like a ghost; coming and going with solemn eyes and a heavy suitcase, and leaving little indication if or when she would return.

But suddenly here she is, and before his heart even has time to do its customary leap, she is in his arms, laughing and kissing his face.

She looks fresher, happier somehow, and the old sparkles that used to light up her eyes have finally rekindled. Enjolras thinks it could have been yesterday that she'd knocked his ice cream into his face, and giving a shaky laugh, he breathes easy for the first time in forever, holding her close in a tight embrace from which he never wants to be freed.

They stay like that for a long time, until at last Éponine pipes up in a husky voice.

"You stink of ciggies."

Laughing, he forces himself to pull away, and gently rests his forehead against hers.

"So you're back."

She closes her eyes and smiles, inhaling the familiar comforting scent of coffee and books and cigarette smoke.

"So I'm back."

* * *

_One day at breakfast she sits down in front of him at the table, coffee in hand and hair dishevelled. _

_He always sees her in these mornings, though each day is never quite the same as the one before. _

_When the warm 9 a.m. sunlight comes glinting through the window frames, her dark hair is wreathed in flecks of gold and grey, no sound in the warm kitchen but the ticking of the old clock that hangs on the wall and an occasional rustle of a newspaper. _

_Sometimes it rains, heavy drops bouncing off the little path leading to the front door, where untended weeds have pushed their way through the cracks in the pavement after a long and frosty winter. (His father, God rest his soul, would lament such negligence of a garden, but Enjolras is rather slower on his feet than he used to be, and it's been years since any ankles have been stung by a nettle anyway, for the children have long since flown the nest, their bicycles and tennis rackets rusting by the garden shed). On these occasions they often do not rise, but stay and eat breakfast in bed, listening to the raindrops fall against the skylight windows, and he thinks she is beautiful under the dim canopy of light. _

_This morning the sky is a clear blue, the sunflowers lifting their heads to worship the rising sun, and Éponine flashes him a sleepy smile before picking up her magazine and taking a sip of her coffee._

_Enjolras watches her read for a while, smiling gently and thinking back over their years together. _

_He remembers the day she'd found the tattered scrap of paper, worn from use and years, but which still bore her name in faded childish handwriting. She'd laughed at his sheepish explanation and kissed him lightly on the cheek, but later that night he had caught her placing it tenderly inside the old nursery book she had always cherished, the keepsake from her childhood that now seems so, so long ago. _

_He remembers the days when he thought he had lost her forever, days he will never ask her about, for life has taught him that some hurts run too deep to ever really be understood by another. Those chapters of her story do not belong to him._

_Still, she is here now, and the time for explanation has long since passed; at last he understands that she will always return to him, no matter how far she wanders. _

_He glances through the open window at the glorious sunny morning, where the birds are singing merrily against the ocean blue of the summer sky, and faint music can be heard drifting over the rooftops; the recently arrived carnival in full swing._

_An idea pops into his head, and he reaches across to touch Éponine's arm._

"_Would you like an ice cream?" _

_Her face lights up and she nods as, laying the magazine to one side, Éponine hoists herself to her feet with a knobbly walking stick and holds out her hand to her husband._

"_With extra pistachios."_

* * *

**_The End._**


End file.
